i got 3 weeks of parental leave when our daughte was born and it was the best 3 weeks of my life, even if we barely slept lol
I got 8 weeks (fucking awesome and crazy) and often think about how I will never have that much time out of work again unless we have another child (while I'm here, provided the policy doesn't change) or I retire. It is hugely depressing.
Maybe PA will pass a paid leave law. We have one in Delaware that's how I got 12 weeks. That was just for state workers but I believe they extended the law to all businesses now? Can't remember
my wife and i decided we were one and done because the pregnancy was just awful for her and, while our daughter is an angel, the newborn stage was just such a struggle. on top of that, there's just zero shot we could afford another kid
I get 8 weeks paid and then 4 more weeks unpaid, but protected by California. With my first kid I got 6 and took them, but was able to work from home after that for almost a year. With my second kid, I took the 8 paid weeks and was going to save the other 4 for later, but then my older kid broke his leg and I had to stay home for that, so it made the whole thing a bit of a mess
Absolutely not trying to change your mind, at all, but I have been pleasantly surprised (only one year in) with how little of a change it has been money-wise adding a second kid to our family. Most everything was already purchased for our first kid, and due to age gap we're only going to have about a year and change of overlapping daycare costs before my older kid is in school
This is why we're done at 2, more or less. I always wanted 2 and she wanted 3 but we're both teachers so I've been telling her for forever that the financials on that don't really add up to affording 3 lol. But also because we started a little late and the first pregnancy almost killed her/caused fertility issues for a while, we didn't have #2 until 5+ years later. If we had a 3rd I'd be like almost 40 if not 40 when it was born....no thank you. More power to you older parents out there but I always wanted to be a younger parent and I've already failed at being as young as I wanted to be for both kids haha
Yeah this is true. Feels like kid #2 financially hasn't changed our financial situation too much. Adding the 3rd is where I'd get nervous.
my best friend had his first kid when he was 18. at the time, i thought oh no, there's no chance i would want a kid that young. but now his son is 18 and he's only 36, and it makes me so jealous because i'll be around 50 when my daughter is 18 lmao
lol yup. Well I didn't want one THAT young but yeah I'm gonna be like 47 or 48 when the first one graduates high school and 52 when the 2nd does. Would have loved to have been in my early 40s instead
Done at two with them being 4 and 6. My wife and I agonized for a bit about whether or not we wanted to try and have a third, but decided to end at two because of finances and Trump getting elected again. I'm content with our decision, but there's definitely some lingering what ifs there.
I got 12 weeks of 2/3 pay through FMLA for our first. Took four weeks up front and then the rest once my wife went back to work when he was 5-months old, then started daycare at 7-months. My company changed their PTO policy last year. We used to get 3 paid sick days and 10 paid vacation days per year. Now it’s tenure-based, and since I’ve been here for like 15 years I get 5 sick days and 30 vacation days. If we have a second it’ll be really nice to take a few extra weeks off at full pay with the extra PTO.
Also re: daycare, our son has been in a Spanish-immersion school that focuses a lot on development and has smaller class sizes. About 10 kids in his 2-3 group. It’s been great for him and he loves his buddies but I’ve mentioned in here before that we pay about $2,300/month and the school will have 56 total days of closures between half days/breaks/development days/holidays. Just super untenable. He starts at his new school in June, they’re open a half hour later which seems like nothing but will make a world of difference on days I have to pick him up. We’re saving $600/month and they’re only closed for major holidays that I’m also off of work for. We’ve taken him in twice for a few hours to meet the kids and teachers and he seems into it so I’m hoping the transition isn’t super hard on him. Every morning I take him to school now and he says “I go see (classmates names)! I see friends!” I feel like the biggest asshole lmao. I don’t know how some parents are brave enough to make major moves once their kids are older, not sure I have the spine for it
9 half days (8am-noon) 12 holidays 6 day break for school maintenance 5 day spring recess 10 day summer recess 5 day thanksgiving recess 12 day winter recess
that's WILD to me, ours just has the standard holidays off and that's all, we've never had a day where the kids were off and I still had work
Yeah, we’ve had to fly one of our mom’s out to cover the long breaks so we don’t burn all our PTO. Very excited to not have to plan around it anymore
The twins are like 2 months out. Thought it’d be a good time to take on team sports for the first time since like.. 2002? So I’m an assistant coach on my daughter’s softball team. This experience has given me more anxiety than anything I’ve experienced, professionally, in years. But fuck, I’m glad I did it.
Nothing gives me more anxiety than coaching my kids’ sports teams. There’s the anxiety of obviously wanting your kid to do well and then there is the anxiety of not wanting all the other kids/parents to hate you.
I really had no interest in sports as a child but was happy that my parents signed me up for them. Great way to socialize outside of the school setting.
I coached my older sons flag football team this past fall while I was out on parental leave and honestly loved it, despite it being like herding cats with that age group. I wish I had more time/energy to coach when not on parental leave. I'm helping out with his baseball team this spring but in an unofficial capacity. He's asking to sign up to play in pads next fall for football which I swore I wasn't going to let him do, but....idk. It's 7u and he'll be 7 so he'll be in the older crew on the team, but between all the concussion stuff and the fact that he's kinda small and is very sweet and nice and doesn't have that killer instinct for sports/isn't as spatially aware as I was at his age.....makes me nervous. But if he does, or even if he plays flag football again, I'll probably tell the coaches I can help out in an unofficial capacity.